The loss accrues not to thy sainted wife;
"Tis like lamenting that she gains release;
Hers is the blessing of that endless life,

Where worldly troubles are absorb'd in peace.

And thinkest Thou, the wand'rer who has sail'd From bleak and barren shores to better climes, To fare in plenty, could be now prevail'd

To fix again 'mid scenes of earlier times?

The same the feelings of the human soul,
When shaken off the flesh's cumb'rous load,
It knows the blessing to have reach'd the goal,
Far from the vileness of its late abode.

Ev'n She, whom thus we venerate and mourn, While the warm tear is trickling down thy cheek, If Heav'n allow'd her, would not now return, Among a world like this her home to seek.

Nor would She now forsake that Heav'nly band,
That soars abstracted from terrestrial views;

And if a crown were proffer'd to her hand,
She would the perishable gift refuse.

CANTO VII.

Triumph of Old Age.

AN ELEGIAC POEM.

CANTO VII.

The Fragility of the Human Frame.

How vain is reason, when involv'd in doubt,

It scarcely dares to fluctuate with hopes! When all around it, is past finding out,

And the clouds thicken more, as error gropes!

Oh, there is light in reason! but it takes

A view on which our being dreads to dwell, And see its vileness, when the glimm'ring makes The darkness of the picture visible.

We are yet breathing, and the curious thought
Has leisure for the question, 'What is man,
"That haughty being?' Tis a thing of nought,
Whose life, when lengthen'd, reaches but a span.

"Tis but a reptile that is born to creep,

And draw his sust'nance from the scanty ground; 'Tis but a mould'ring corpse, from which a heap Of ashes only may next year be found.

"Tis a light insect, that, on gilded wing,
Forgets it lately was a crawling worm;
Then swept from nature ere another spring,
It leaves no vestige of its pristine form.

Yet man forgets, or thinks not, while his pride
Grasps at performance of immortal deeds,
That Heav'n forbids it, and that far and wide,
Where laurels grew, shall spring oblivion's weeds.

Ah! what is glory? Death in ambush lurks
To stop the hero's progress, when not half
Is yet completed of those mighty works,
Which prove as empty and as light as chaff.